BJ's Restaurant & Brewery Coming to Hillsboro

I've long bemoaned the relative small number of craft beer offerings in the western suburbs of Portland. Lately, things have been changing. Vertigo Brewing opened a taproom adjacent to their brewery, Golden Valley Brewery launched a new brewpub, and Uptown Market opened a bottle shop and homebrew store.

Even with these additions, the western 'burbs of Portland remain a woefully under penetrated market for craft beer. BJ's Restaurant & Brewery must have noticed this. They're currently in the process of setting up shop in Hillsboro on the corner of Cornelius Pass and Cornell. Construction is underway and the restaurant is set to open this fall.

BJ's is a chain of 122 casual dining restaurants located mainly in the western US. They currently have two locations in Oregon (Jantzen Beach and Eugene). I first went to BJ's when I visited the Phoenix area. They've got great pizza and they make their own beer–which happens to be pretty darn good!

I'm just thrilled to have another craft beer option in my neck of the woods. Even better, this one's kid friendly! I'll try to get details about when the new location will open. In the meantime, check out their beer list.

4 comments:

Yeah, their beer is ok. Not great. Actually they just moved all of their brewing to Arizona, so they no longer brew in Oregon. They still have their brew house up at the Jantzen Beach location so it looks like it though.

On closer look, they're calling it BJ's Restaurant and BREWHOUSE (instead of Brewery). It makes sense for them to centralize brewing and benefit from the economies of scale. They're a chain restaurant, so I won't fault them for that.

While I love the bottomless basket of fries at Red Robin, I never drink the beer there. I like BJ's beer, and I'm looking forward to it. I'd probably be less enthusiastic if I lived on the east side of Portland--but I don't.